Woman gets probation in theft case

Amy Lynn Smith beat heroin cold turkey but not before it caused her to steal thousands of dollars of jewelry from a Things Remembered warehouse in North Jackson.

Thursday, she tearfully told Judge Maureen Sweeney of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court that she was sorry for what she did and is now trying to make up for it.

“I was a good person up to this point and I want to get my life back,” Smith said.

Smith, 35, of North Jackson, was sentenced to probation and ordered to pay back more than $62,000 to Things Remembered after she entered a guilty plea to a charge of grand theft. James Baumgart of Things Remembered, who is in loss prevention, said Smith was caught on video in March stealing items on her lunch break at the North Jackson warehouse.

Until then, Smith had worked for Things Remembered for 15 years, Baumgart said.

When an initial report was made in March with police, the value of the stolen property was listed at more than $28,000 but Thursday Assistant Prosecutor Rob Andrews asked Sweeney to make Smith pay almost $150,000 in restitution.

Baumgart said that at the time of the initial police report there had only been an initial investigation but since then more thorough investigations revealed what was taken and how much it was worth, both in wholesale and retail value. He said Smith took pendants and other sterling silver jewelry and pawned a lot of them to local pawn shops. Several of those were able to be recovered, Baumgart said.

He said the thefts were discovered when an internet order was made. When workers went to fill the order, the merchandise they requested was nowhere to be found.